Married Couples Who Smoke Marijuana are Less Likely to Encounter Domestic Violence

Want less domestic violence? Pot smoking seems to be the answer--at least according to a new study. Scientists have found that the more often that couples smoked marijuana, the less likely they were to engage in domestic violence.

The researchers examined 634 couples in an attempt to clarify inconsistent findings about domestic violence among pot-smoking couples. In the end, they found that more frequent marijuana use by husbands and wives predicted less frequent intimate partner violence perpetration by husbands. In addition, husbands' marijuana use also predicted less frequent intimate partner violence perpetration by wives.

"These findings suggest that marijuana use is predictive of lower levels of aggression towards one's partner in the following year," said Kenneth Leonard, one of the researchers, in a news release. "As in other survey studies of marijuana and partner violence, our study examines patterns of marijuana use and the occurrence of violence within a year period. It does not examine whether using marijuana on a given day reduces the likelihood of violence at that time."

In fact, the new study supports that marijuana doesn't increase aggressive conflict. In fact, it hints that pot may actually decrease it. That said, more research needs to be conducted.

"It is possible, for example, that-similar to a drinking partnership-couples who use marijuana together may share similar values and social circles, and it is this similarity that is responsible for reducing the likelihood of conflict," said Leonard. "We would like to see research replicating these findings, and research examining day-to-day marijuana and alcohol use and the likelihood to IPV on the same day before drawing stronger conclusions."

The findings are published in the journal Psychology of Addictive Behaviors.